Search Engine Optimization - An Overview
By Robert Abrom
The term “Search Engine Optimization,” or SEO, has become a pronounced buzz term in Internet commerce. SEO is simply the process of improving the amount of volume, also known as traffic, to a website by placing it as high as possible in search results through a search engine such as Google, MSN, or Yahoo!. Better search engine placement means a greater likelihood your website will be found and viewed by potential customers. Searches can be industry-specific, location-specific, or image-specific.
The search engine results process involves a “spider” crawling the web page, downloading it, and storing it on the search engine’’s own server. A second program indexes specific information from the web page, such as words and phrases on the page and links contained in the page. This is how the importance of keywords came to be.
Unfortunately, webmasters would manipulate page rankings by stuffing the page full of keywords. The pages may have made it to the top of search engine lists, but many times the websites contained information irrelevant to the customer, or the webpage was so difficult to read the customer would ignore the content.
To combat this problem, search engines now have a much more complex method of scanning a web page for relevance, making it more difficult for webmasters to manipulate search results.
Getting Indexed
There are two methods of marketing your website so it can be indexed by search engines. The first is the ”natural” method, where search algorithms scan a complex number of factors such as relevance of keywords, relevance to the customer, and inbound links to determine indexing and placement. Search engines such as Google offer methods of submitting your web page to guarantee indexing. Pages that are indexed should automatically be discovered by other search engine crawlers.
The other method of indexing is paid indexing. Yahoo! Is one search engine that offers either flat-fee or pay-per-click options of listing your website. Paying for indexing does not guarantee the website’’s standing in search results, only that it will be included.
SEO Techniques
Techniques used for search engine optimization fall into two categories, white hat and black hat.
White hat techniques are those that search engines recommend and that conform to the search engine’’s guidelines. It is generally explained as creating content for users, then making that content easy for spiders to access. One important aspect of white hat techniques is that the web page indexed by the search engine is the same content the user will see.
Black hat techniques involve methods that attempt to trick the search engine into better rankings, or that involve deception. Hidden text, cloaking (delivering a different page to search engine crawlers than the one delivered to human website visitors), and loading a page with paid links are all examples of tricks that can get you into trouble with search engines.
Improving Your Odds of Discovery
There are over 200 factors that search engines take into account to rate web pages. You must take a balanced approach when determining how to best get your website discovered and indexed by search engines.
Keywords are important, but be certain your content is well-balanced and the keywords are used sparingly. Make your content easy to read, with your key word or phrase included at least once on the page. Heavy keyword repetition is known as spamming and could get you into trouble.
Adding links from trusted sites, supported by relevant text and page content and that are relevant to your industry, are the ones that will help your site.
When submitting to article directories, create useful, meaningful content that is informative and will encourage readers to link to. Videos, blogs, product reviews, and so forth are other informative ways of encouraging reader links to your page.
When developing your web content, keep the above factors in mind and ensure you are catering to the best interests of your clients and not to the search engines.
About The Author
Robert Abrom is the CEO of Abrom Research Inc., find more resources for your journey to entrepreneurship at http://abromresearch.com
The Big Three, Focus For The Search Engine Optimisation Industry
By Thomas Pretty
Search engine optimisation is usually concerned with ”the big three” of the search engine industry. The problem is that each of these search engines has a different algorithm and different sets of rules, some sites, through efficient optimisation have managed to get to number one on all of them. That is the challenge set to most optimisers, with three major websites that mange the traffic of millions, the other, minor search engines are simply not worth the pursuit of optimisation.
While the big three have different algorithm and systems, ultimately their goals are the same; to provide the user with the most relevant results. This means that despite their different methods it is possible to pursue optimisation simultaneously.
That said if using search engine for highly competitive phrases it will be hard to reach a triple number one spot. Choosing the right level of competition for search terms is essential, if competition is too high it will be hard to keep rankings, too easy and you will find that the search terms are rarely used and traffic to your site will suffer.
To discuss methods of search engine optimisation for all three it is easier to discuss them singularly. What must be considered is that MSN is usually the simplest, followed by Yahoo and then the jewel in the crown for any optimisation company; Google.
Performing search engine optimisation for MSN means creating a site with a distinct theme and many links. MSN tends to pick up on changes more quickly then the other two making the process considerably quicker if focussing on results purely on MSN.
Despite its number three place in popularity, it is believed MSN searchers are nearly fifty percent more likely to purchase items than other search engine users. Most importantly is to create a solid site with a coherent theme throughout. Linking should bring results in a matter of months.
Yahoo for a large part of its development relied upon the same sort of system than MSN, making search engine optimisation relatively simple for the two of them. However, of late Yahoo have switched and started to follow the Google example. This is most probably due to the huge popularity of Google, and its dominant position in the search engine industry.
Yahoo has begun to place an emphasis upon the temporal nature of links making optimisation a constant effort if Yahoo is the focus. It also lengthens the optimisation process but makes efforts ultimately worthwhile as aged links are highly respected.
Google is the focus for much of the search engine optimisation industry, as the world’’s most popular search engine, this is unsurprising. Rankings in Google are the hardest to obtain but the traffic created is the highest in number. The usual ethical methods of optimisation apply; unique content, a large amount of that content and well built links are all vital for high rankings. It takes the longest of any of the others but rewards are the largest. Time is a factor as more emphasis is placed upon the history of a page than the other search engines.
Logically your first goal is to target MSN as the easiest of the three, then Yahoo and finally Google. However, seemingly if you are doing things right for one search engine results in the other two will follow. Naturally Google will be the primary objective but the amount of traffic from the other two is still sizeable.
If you follow the general principles of creating large amounts of unique, relevant content and high quality links your site will start to climb up the rankings. Do not however expect immediate success; optimisation campaigns for all three will take time, all require an elongated effort to achieve decent rankings.
About The Author
Internet marketing expert Thomas Pretty looks into how search engine optimisation is different for the industry big three. To find out more please visit http://www.highposition.net/
Getting Ranked Higher on Search Engines
By Jim Pretin
If you are new to internet marketing, you are probably facing the horrifying task of trying to get your site listed on the first page of the search engines. You probably have no idea how to improve your ranking or where to begin. For the purposes of this discussion, we will outline the procedures you should follow to do better on the search engines, while still making sure that you attract qualified traffic that will actually be receptive to the products or services that your website offers.
The first thing you need to understand is that your search engine ranking will not improve overnight. Watch our for Search Engine Optimization (SEO) consultants. They will charge you a hefty sum for their services, sometimes as much as $2,000 per month or more. They often make dubious claims that they can get you ranked on the first page of the search engines within a few months, and they will usually offer a money-back guarantee.
However, once you pay the initial deposit and the SEO company begins working on your website, they will rig your website so that you will be able to quickly rise to the top of the rankings for insignificant keywords that will not attract any visitors to your site.
For example, if your website provides auto insurance quotes, any SEO consultant knows that it will be extremely difficult to get your website ranked on the first page of Google for a highly sought after phrase such as AUTO INSURANCE QUOTES. So, instead, they will pick a less popular phrase, such as AUTO INSURANCE QUOTES FAST, for which there is no competition, and you will quickly rise to the top. The only problem is no one will ever actually use that exact phrase when searching for auto insurance quotes, so even though the SEO company delivered on its promise to improve your ranking, you will still not receive any traffic.
So, you need to use a different approach if you want to not only improve your ranking, but also attract qualified traffic to your website. The first thing you need to do is optimize your website for the keywords or phrases that people actually use when searching for products or services related to what you offer. For example, if you sell candy, you would want to improve your ranking for the phrases BUY CANDY or BUY CANDY ONLINE. To optimize your website for your chosen keywords, you should either hire a web designer that has experience optimizing websites, or you should purchase search engine optimization software that will show you how to optimize your HTML code so that your site is set up properly. You should also try to have a decent amount of free content on your website that relates to your subject matter.
The next step is to submit your site to the search engines, if you have not already done so. There are hundreds or even thousands of legitimate search engines and directories in cyberspace, and you should submit to all them. I recommend that you look for search engine submission companies on Google and pick one that charges a small monthly fee to submit your site to the search engines once every month.
The last and most crucial step to improving your ranking is increasing your link popularity. You can write articles and submit them to article submission directories. At the bottom of each article you write, you are allowed to include a link to your website. As the articles you write are put into circulation and are published on other websites, your link popularity will increase. Also, you should do some pay-per-click or other paid advertising in order to promote your business, and eventually you will acquire some links as the word spreads about your site.
If you employ each of the strategies we have discussed, you should be able to improve your search engine ranking. No website can improve upon its ranking overnight, but if you are persistent, eventually, your hard work will pay off.
About The Author
Jim Pretin is the owner of http://www.forms4free.com, a service that helps programmers make free HTML forms.
Search Engine Optimization for Realtors
By Michael Alves
“If you build it they will come”, does not apply to websites.
Search Engine Optimization, popularly known as SEO, is the process of optimizing a website to increase its popularity and ranking in the search engine listings. Now that you have a new website, you will have to consider how to attract the customers that are looking for your services, to your new site.
Get your site submitted to the search engines. Make sure your website is submitted to the Google index. If you”re not sure if it is, you can use this link to go to Google’’s site submission page. Remember to use the “http://www.” when you submit your website. http://www.google.com/addurl/?continue=/addurl. Or a great way to do this is to use Google’’s new XML site maps to feed your website content right into the servers at Google. To do this you don”t have to know XML coding, just go to this Google website and follow the directions. http://www.google.com/webmasters/sitemaps/docs/en/overview.html The really great news is that it is free to use either of these methods.
We have all herd the expression “Content is king”.This is a phrase that you hear over and over again when optimizing a website. Having fresh content on your website each time the spider indexes your site, is an excellent way to increase your page rank. You will notice that many of the websites that you will be competing with are “static”, other than new listings; the content on their site remains the same. Don”t make this mistake! Spiders hate stale websites! You can set up an RSS Feed for your website that will deliver content relevant articles for your site visitors to read. These articles will be rotated daily or weekly to give your website the fresh content that spiders love. Feed the spider and he will reward you with a higher page rank. A good place to start looking for content relevant RSS feeds for your visitors would be the National Association of Realtors website, http://www.realtor.org or you might try http://www.inman.com.
Finally, you don”t have to wait to be on the first page of Google to start making real estate commissions. A professionally created and managed pay per click advertising program can start sending potential customers to your website within 48 hours.Google’’s pay per click advertising program is called “Google AdWwords”. When someone types into a search a keyword phrase that matches the keyword phrases in your AdWords campaign, your ad will show. You can have your ad say anything you want, pay per click advertising is very flexible, and you only pay when someone clicks on your ad and goes to your website. If you”re not ranked on the first page of Google, this is how you get customers to come to your website instead of your competitors website. Get your pay per click campaign under way today.
About The Author
Mike Alves is the owner of http://www.Marketing4Leads.com
My business is unique, I market Realtors websites on Google. If you would like to get the edge on you”re competition, I can help. Let Mike create a custom advertising campaign on Google for your Real Estate website.
Online Business Entrepreneur Talks About Linking And SEO
By Russell Marsh
All online business entrepreneurs worth their salt know that to create a long term successful business it′’s virtually a necessity to get a good ranking in Google and the other Search Engines. Other methods of traffic generation such as PPC and even simply buying traffic can be useful in the short term but as ”Google Adwords”
”Cost per Click” seem to be rising all the time this ”bought traffic” is getting to be more and more a short term measure and not something webmasters should see a
long term solution to getting sustainable traffic to their websites.
When Google changed it′’s algorithm and decided to mainly rank sites according to link popularity this was the signal for lots of link farms to spring up and the
reason for lots of emails in our inboxes asking for reciprocal links. Initially people didn”t really understand the fact that the pages the links were on had to be relevant to the subject of the linked website and you could have a Garden Online Business being approached by a Watches For Sale website for a reciprocal link. This was soon found to have no value and even relevant reciprocal links have now lost most of their value as Google rapidly became aware that people were merely swapping links to try to manipulate the Search Engines.
If you ask any Online Business Owner what they consider to be the most effective medium to long term solution to getting visitors to their websites they will tell You “Get as many inbound one way links to your website from other websites where the content on the page is relate to what your website is about.”
This sounds very complicated - How are you to get webmasters of other websites to put a link on their pages to your website when they don”t expect you to reciprocate?
The answer is very simple. The first option, and any serious online business owner should already have been doing this, is to submit your website to Website Directories. These Directories are nothing more than privately owned ”libraries” if you like where you can search for websites in different categories. There are lots of resources for doing this and you can even buy software to help speed up the process. Normally you enter all the details normally required by the Directories and then as you go to the next Directory in the list the software pastes the information straight in to the fields required.
The next option for getting quality one way inbound links is now considered to be one of the most powerful advertising tactics available and that is Article Writing and Submitting. Article Writing can have a two fold benefit for the online business owner.
1, The article is submitted with a resource box which contains a link back to the writers website. This is a one way - targeted - highly relevant link. Great stuff!
2, People go to Article Directories, where the writers have submitted their articles and read articles about things they are interested in. They are also allowed to take away these articles and use them for their own sites Providing they leave the resource box intact - that′’s another quality link back to the online business owner’’s website.
Also people very often click these links in resource boxes, especially if it′’s a well written article, which brings instant traffic.
A well written article properly submitted can bring the online business owner highly targeted traffic for years to come, not bad for an hours work.
About The Author
Russell Marsh is an independent Internet Marketer. This
Online Business website
helpandinfo.com has lots of resources and help for those wishing to make a living on the internet. Russell is a Consultant
with CarbonCopyPro
Link Your Way to a Higher Search Engine Ranking
Are you serious about driving traffic to your website? If you are then you should develop a linking strategy. People follow the recommendations of trusted websites. When a trusted website links to yours you suddenly get immediate attention. There are three major link strategies: 1) Purchasing text links 2) Employing a link finding service 3) Reciprocal linking.
This article focuses on the latter-reciprocal linking. Reciprocal linking means that your website links to another and their website links back to yours. Its a great way to increase your ranking in search engines. Search engines use link popularity to rank sites. Therefore exchanging reciprocal links with other websites will encourage visitors to not only visit your website but bookmark it as well.
Now, this is not as simple as throwing your links all over the World Wide Web. If that were the case nearly all websites would be popular. In order to have success with reciprocal linking you should bare in mind these factors. >> Read more
